CHAPTER 9
Maneuvers
CROSS COUNTRY TRAVEL was quite different in 1955 than it is today, especially by automobile. Most of the roads we traveled on were single lane since the Federal Highway Act was not signed into law until 1956. There were no charge cards either. Dad kept all the money they had to their name in his pocket, and they budgeted carefully. The processes we’d follow for all our road trips from post to post began then. After eight to ten hours on the road, Dad would pull up to a hotel and my mother would run in, then come out to announce whether we’d stay or drive on. When she’d announce, “They want too much money,” Dad would say, “Okay. Let’s move on.” After two or three tries, we’d find a place that fit the budget.
Unless we were on a turnpike or “major road,” there weren’t any restaurants along the way. Mom made sandwiches in the car and gave us fruit; we’d take advantage of restaurants that were open if we happened to drive through a town at the right time. We also ate in people’s homes.
“You’d see a sign that said, ‘We Serve,’ lunch or dinner.” Dad told me. “They usually had two or three selections. Almost always mashed potatoes.” He smiled. My father loves mashed potatoes. “They were nice people, and we enjoyed talking to them.”
I was introduced to Howard Johnson restaurants and hotels on that trip. Dad gave me a taste of my first clam roll. Thereafter, clam rolls were my favorite food on road trips. My brother would get the kid’s hotdog meal and I’d ask for a clam roll with coleslaw on the side and a scoop of pistachio ice cream for dessert.
“When we got to Tulsa, we stayed in the Thunderbird Hotel,” Dad remembered. “At least, I think that was the name. And we ordered breakfast from room service. That was high living for us.”
I didn’t remember that part of our trip, but I remembered the Magic Fingers massaging beds and that sometimes you had to put money in the television to watch it.
“Remember having to go into the woods to pee? Or using the little pot from our potty chair?” I asked Dad.
“Well, you do what you have to do,” he said.
I learned a lot about teamwork on our trips. Things went better if people tried to get along, if we were considerate with one another, if my brother stayed on his side of the backseat. There were no seat belts then either. My brother and I took turns riding in the back window, sometimes napping, sometimes watching the people in the car behind us. I remember being small enough to stand up straight in the back seat or run from one side of the car to the other until one of my parents yelled, “Sit down!” There were a few bloody lips along the way when Dad stopped short and one of us flew into the other or into the backs of Dad’s or Mom’s seat.
Once we arrived in Lawton, Oklahoma, we moved into quarters on Fort Sill. There were two bedrooms, one bath, and lots of speckled black linoleum that seemed to go on forever because we had no furniture. Dad and Mom bought some furniture at Sears, including a loveseat, chair, and coffee table, but within a year Mom found a furnished duplex off post in downtown Lawton. We lived there for the rest of our time in Oklahoma. I saw my first buffalo, jackrabbits, snakes, and oil wells.
We lived through a tornado that pelted our neighbors’ storm cellar doors with hail the size of softballs. I learned that people could live underground if they had enough food, water, and air. I was introduced to the histories of the Comanche and the Anadarko. Pictures of me at the time show me wearing a cow-girl outfit, a six-shooter, and a feathered headband, innocent and unaware of the tragic history of Native Americans in this country.
My brother and I were happy. Mom and Dad seemed happy too. Sometimes late on a summer afternoon, Mom would pile Little Lowen (that’s what we called my brother Jim then) and me into the car. We’d meet Dad and drive to a picnic area and eat baked potatoes out of “tin foil boats” before Dad drove us to the officers’ club swimming pool or we went home because he was that day’s Duty Officer. I loved the nights they’d dress us in our pajamas and take us to the drive-in movie. Dad pulled up to a pole in the ground, rolled the window up or down to the right level, and hung the speaker so we could all hear. My parents allowed us to watch the coming attractions and the cartoons before the featured film, but then we were tucked into the back seat and expected to fall asleep. I seldom did until we rode home.
Instead, I saw movies like Friendly Persuasion and High Noon by peeking over the seat. I tried not to make any noise and moved slowly to avoid their attention. I thought I fooled them until we got home, and I waited for my father to pick me up to bring me into the house.
“I’ll carry your brother in, Nancie. Since you’re awake, you can make it in yourself.” Sometimes he’d wink at me, sharing my secret.
After nearly two years, Dad was transferred to Fort Benning, Georgia, for a short assignment before heading to Germany. That is when military posts began to feel like home to me. Though they were not exactly alike, you could expect certain things—a post exchange, commissary, dispensary/hospital, NCO (non-commissioned officer) and officers’ clubs, barracks, motor pools, chapels, and parade fields. No matter how different the last town or city we lived near was from the one we moved to, driving onto the post felt like coming home. Everything was familiar, from the military vehicles to the color of the buildings to the sounds.
We could expect to hear “Reveille” in the morning when the flag was raised, “Retreat” in the afternoon when the flag came down, and “Taps” at night for lights out. I loved that time of day when the trumpet would sound Retreat and no matter where you were—playing ball, on a swing, coming out of a building—everyone stopped as the flag came down, even if you couldn’t see it. But even now, my favorite sound on any post is the sound of a platoon of soldiers marching or jogging in formation while someone calls cadence. Whether it’s the thump, thump, thump of their combat boots or the call-and-response of the cadence, I’m not sure. But it’s steady and familiar. I used to think my “strut song” should be a cadence call. I seldom knew the words of the cadence being called, but I knew the “chorus”:
Sound off, one two,
Sound off, three four,
Sound off, one, two—three four!
Whatever my emotion at the time—anxiety, fear, loneliness—my heart would fall into rhythm with the sound of boots hitting the asphalt, and I’d steady out. I was home.
CHAPTER 10
Platoon
A PLATOON IS DEFINED as the smallest unit in the United States Army, if you don’t count the squads within it. To my childish mind, military families were like platoons. I felt a kinship with the young soldiers who sat among us at Saturday morning movies, shopped at the PX (Post Exchange), or worshiped alongside us at religious services on the weekends. The children of soldiers, airmen, sailors, and marines, especially when I grew up, were well versed in all things military. And this was reinforced by our parents.
While we grew up, Dad always spoke of us as a team, a team in which each of us played a part, and, he stressed, “At the end, we only have each other. The five of us. That’s all. We take care of each other.”
It was true that each of us had a specific role, even the children. As oldest child, though, I outranked my brothers, who shared the rank equivalent to privates, due to years-in-grade or, in this case, birth order.
Rank has its privilege. Seats in the car were assigned by rank. Mom sat up front with Dad. In the back seat, my youngest brother, Clint, sat between our brother Jim and me. Jim and I got the window seats because we outranked Clint. I got my choice of window because I outranked Jim. Even now, especially since Mom is no longer with us, if my brothers and I get into Dad’s car, he drives, and my brothers’ first instinct is to stand back and allow me to ride shotgun, the seat my mother always occupied. I wish it were due to respect and deference, but it’s just muscle memory from our basic training.
The Army’s version of a platoon is led by a junior officer, usually a lieutenant supported by the platoon sergeant. Each squad has a leader. I admit to being somewhat confused abo
ut which of my parents held the highest rank in our platoon. If Dad was home, Mom might say, “You’ll have to ask your father about that.” And sometimes when I asked him something, he would say, “That’s up to your mother.” With parents, it seemed that area of expertise determined who was in charge.
Eventually, I got a sense that the ultimate decision maker had less to do with rank and more to do with a division of labor they’d drawn up together. Of course, when Dad was on TDY (temporary duty) or on a hardship tour, usually twelve months or more (Korea or Vietnam, for instance), Mom outranked everyone. No questions asked.
The summer before I turned twelve, expectations and responsibilities changed for me. My mother required surgery, and during the weeks leading up to the operation, she taught me how to do laundry, iron, and plan and prepare meals, as well as clean up afterwards, all of which I would have to do for the six weeks after she was released from the hospital. I already knew how to make beds, clean bathrooms, mop floors, vacuum, dust, and polish silver, brass, and the furniture. We all did, as these were chores we completed as a family every Saturday when we “policed the area.”
I took on my new responsibilities with energy and enthusiasm. Years later my mother said she had been worried about how much I seemed to enjoy those tasks. What I really enjoyed was how much she and Dad seemed to appreciate my hard work.
There were only two real failures that I recall. I once starched dad’s boxers. He let me know, “That won’t be necessary. Ever again. Leave that step out.” And Mom stopped me from serving hotdogs wrapped in semi-raw bacon to my brothers, my mock rumaki recipe (sans chicken liver and water chestnut slices, neither of which I’d ever seen at that point in my life) I’d cut out of Good Housekeeping or The Ladies Home Journal.
From then on, I continued to help Mom with housekeeping, while Dad taught the boys as they got older how to rake leaves, mow the lawn, and fix things around the house. But we continued to share Saturday area policing as a family.
The division of labor was clear. Inside work was women’s work. Outside work was men’s work. And I noticed that more and more I became my mother’s responsibility, while my brothers were my father’s.
That summer brought more changes. One day Mom called to me while I played baseball in the sandlot across from the house as I’d done for the past two summers. I was proud of my ability to play baseball as well as if not better than the boys I played with. It was the one thing I still felt totally comfortable doing. I loved the slap of the ball hitting my mitt if I squatted behind home plate or caught a line drive, loved the feeling of diving for the ball and spinning to throw it to someone else’s waiting glove. And I loved hitting the ball.
She and Dad sat me down in the living room and she said, “You can’t keep playing baseball with those boys.”
“Why?” I asked. I looked at my father. This couldn’t be his idea. He knew I was as good at fielding, hitting, and double plays as the guys. He knew how important baseball was. He’d taught my brothers and me how to play. We all played together.
“You could be hurt, Nancie.”
“How?” I pointed out that anyone could be hurt, my brothers included. I always kept my eye on the ball and I never put my glove up in front of my face unless totally necessary—and then did not move it until the ball was no longer in play. I didn’t stand too close to anyone with a bat. Once when younger, a boy whacked me with a bat because neither of us was paying attention. It was the last time I made that mistake. I really did not understand why we were having this conversation.
There had only been that one time the other day while pitching, when Frank surprised me by hitting a line drive that I caught in my solar plexus. It knocked me down and I lost my breath. The boys all ran to gather around me, help me up, brush the red dirt off my shirt and pants. I did not mention how much I’d liked that.
“Nancie, those boys are much bigger than you are. And they’ll continue to be,” Mom said. “It’s dangerous, honey.”
My father stepped in to help my mother. “You’re a pretty girl, Nancie. What if you get hit in the face? What if you get hit in the chest?”
My mother and I stared at him. I had no idea what he was talking about. I caught my mother’s expression as she looked at him too. Did she roll her eyes? Then she said, “Thank you, Lowen, I’ll handle this.” My father seemed relieved that he’d been dismissed.
Mom became, as she seemed always to be after that time, the messenger bearing bad news. “That’s it. No more baseball. I’m sorry.” Her tone reminded me that she didn’t have to supply a reason, answer my questions, or entertain any appeals. The meeting was over. I hung up my glove.
In the ensuing weeks, I sulked and felt sorry for myself. I stayed in my room, sometimes watching the guys play ball without me. My parents ignored me. Then one day my mother took me to shop for clothes.
“If she thinks she’s going to bribe me with clothes, she’s wrong,” I thought, crossing my arms and pouting in the front seat of the car. I could have cared less about clothes, or so I told myself. I soon realized our trips to the store for new clothes were for more than back-to-school garb. She bought me new gloves and hats, which I usually got only for Easter. Then a garter belt and stockings. I wouldn’t be wearing those to school, I swore to myself.
A few days later she said, “Let’s have tea. We’ll use the silver service.”
My mother gave me lessons in pouring tea and coffee using the prized silver tea and coffee service they’d purchased in Germany. I learned how to hold a cup and saucer properly, and I became proficient at how to politely ask guests their preference. My ability to field a grounder transferred to pouring scalding liquid into a porcelain cup without shaking or spilling a drop while I asked, “Cream? Sugar? One lump or two?”
One Saturday morning toward the end of summer, Mom had me dress up in a lovely coral-colored dress with white piping. I wore my white gloves, garter belt, and stockings. No hat that day. Dad took a picture of us sitting on the sofa in which Mom looks somewhat apprehensive. My expression is that of one being kidnapped, albeit by someone I knew. My eyes ask, “Why am I dressed like this? Where is she taking me? Why are we taking pictures?”
Mom and I drove to the officers’ club at Fort Gordon. There we joined the other officers’ wives and their daughters for the Back to School Tea. I would learn later that Coffees were held in the mornings, Teas in the afternoon. I looked around the large room. The other girls were my age or older, all in gloves and stockings, some as uncomfortable as me and others flitting about as though they’d discovered their natural calling. We took turns pouring. The room echoed with “Tea? Coffee? One lump or two?”
I know now that the distance between my father and me began to lengthen then, and I started to assign reasons why. He was promoted, which brought more job responsibility as well as frequent social obligations for my parents. I blamed lack of time. And I blamed my mother. I believed she was trying to prevent me from being close to my father. In addition, we readied for another move, this time to Taiwan.
I was changing, too. I had new interests, including boys, clothes, teen magazines, and the local radio station. Of course, the typical emotional ups and downs of relationships with my friends distracted me. Something else happened, too.
My mother became my primary mentor—or, as I saw it, “handler.” More and more I viewed her as messenger of bad news, whether from my parents or the world at large. My girlfriends and I discussed how our fathers were “brought in” for serious discussions when “she” (our mothers) needed backup. We saw this as a demonstration of weakness rather than one of strategy and strength. So our changing relationships with our fathers seemed perfectly normal. Our delight at growing up masked our sadness about the childhood we left behind or any uneasiness we might possibly have about what the future held.
CHAPTER 11
Distaff
MY FATHER AND I stared at the moving boxes stacked in the back of his SUV after one of our trips between the two houses,
much of the contents of which had been given to me by my parents at various stages of our lives. When I moved into my first apartment, married for the first time, and any time after that when my parents moved up to when they retired, I was a convenient and willing storage option. Some of the boxes had not been unpacked in years. I’d just carried them with me from marriage to marriage and now back to Dad’s house.
Between what he and I owned and all the boxes, we could open a formal catering business. Pots and pans, multiple sets of day-to-day and formal china—all from different places and used for different purposes. One didn’t get rid of such things. Who knew whether any or all of your belongings might get from one station to another during a move? And who knew what your children might need someday? Or your grandchildren?
“Why do you have all of this?” he asked me. “Do you really need it all? We could take some to the Salvation Army.”
“Ha!” I laughed. “A lot of this stuff is Mom’s and yours. Things you two didn’t really want to get rid of yourselves. Think of them as back home where they belong. We can put what isn’t needed in the shed. Maybe one of my girls will need something.”
“Well, you’ll sort it out,” he said, and headed into the house.
“I’m taking a break first. I’ll make tea.”
As the water boiled, I stared at the side of the refrigerator. Random magnets supported the business cards of plumbers, electricians, and pest control companies. Pieces of notepaper listed names and numbers for doctors, the dentist, and emergency contacts.
Growing up, one always found the roster near the phone. This consisted of many pages of what we, today, might consider too much information about the men and women serving in my father’s command at the time. Issued by the battalion, the roster contained information about the personnel assigned to it, such as name, rank, position, phone number, and home address. The column that interested me most was entitled “distaff.” Here one also found the information about spouses—always female in those days as women would not be integrated into combat units until 1978—along with their children’s names and ages. I used to absorb and memorize the information on the roster.
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